this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2023
792 points (97.8% liked)

Technology

59590 readers
4961 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
L4s@lemmy.world
L3s@fry.gs
L4s@fry.gs
enu@lemmy.world
792
40% of US electricity is now emissions-free (arstechnica.com)
submitted 11 months ago by boem@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
111 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 3 points 11 months ago (2 children)

What I think is interesting is just how variable it is. This Wikipedia article breaks it down by state. There's no obvious political explanation here, and even very similar states have very different energy production.

For example, here's the top 10 (with 2016/2020 presidential party vote):

  1. Vermont (D) - 99.7%
  2. South Dakota (R) - 82.7%
  3. Washington (D) - 81.9%
  4. New Hampshire (D) - 71.6%
  5. Idaho (R) - 70.2%
  6. Maine (D) - 66.1%
  7. Oregon (D) - 65%
  8. Illinois (D) - 64.5%
  9. South Carolina (R) - 60.8%
  10. Kansas (R) - 60.8%

And the bottom 10 (ignoring DC):

41 - Massachusetts (D) - 17.8%
42 - Ohio (R) - 17.4%
43 - Florida (R) - 17.4%
44 - Missouri (R) - 16.6%
45 - Utah (R) - 12.4%
46 - Indiana (R) - 9.8%
47 - Kentucky (R) - 7.6%
48 - Rhode Island (D) - 7.2%
49 - West Virginia (R) - 5.1%
50 - Delaware (D) - 3.2%

So 6/10 of the top 10 are states that voted Democrat, and 7/10 of the bottom 10 are states that voted Republican. That trend doesn't really tell the story though (3 of the next 5 voted Republican), which is really interesting because it's such a political talking point at the national level (e.g. Dems are in favor of green energy, Reps are in favor of fossil fuels).

Even some very similar, adjacent states have very different generation numbers:

  • Alabama (43%) vs Mississippi (20%)
  • Idaho (70%) vs Utah (12%)
  • Tennessee (59%) vs Kentucky (8%)

So there's a lot of progress that can be made at the low end by pointing at their neighbors.

[–] AnneBonny@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 11 months ago

What I think is interesting is just how variable it is.

The states themselves are very different from each other.

[–] ironeagl@sh.itjust.works 1 points 10 months ago

Try breaking it down by county.